Tonneau covers mounted on pickup truck beds are common. Tonneau covers are generally used to help contain and/or conceal goods in the truck bed, and to protect the goods from weather. Various designs of tonneau covers are available. For example, U.S. Pat. No. Re. 33,790 to Huber and U.S. Pat. No. 3,829,151 to Fellenstein describe tonneau covers having hard and rigid covers over the pickup truck beds. Such covers can be heavy and difficult to manipulate.
Many designs exist for flexible tonneau covers. For example, see U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,730,866 and 4,838,602 listing James Nett as an inventor; and U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,251,960; 5,121,960; 5,365,994; 4,693,033; 5,310,238; and 5,058,652 listing Donald Wheatley as an inventor. The tonneau covers described by these patents can be referred to as soft tonneau covers. Several of the presently available designs incorporate snap-type connections. It has been observed that snap connections can sometimes be difficult to operate, and can cause stress lines in the tonneau cover fabric. Furthermore, it has been observed that the tonneau cover fabric becomes soft in warm weather which causes it to sag. In cold weather, the fabric loses its flexibility and becomes stiff, and thus, becomes hard to install and may be prone to tear.